Tom Wolfe astounds me whenever I read him, and I am reading him again, now. He is, perhaps, one of the most gifted writers of this generation. Wolfe writes about the depth and surface of human experience. People too often, and mistakenly, talk about Wolfe’s interest in status. That’s there, of course, but Tom Wolfe can write with insight and sensitivity about the soul, about spirituality, and the conflict of spirituality with the contemporary world and its vapid secularity–giving all their own voice.

Sometimes it is difficult to recognize the shining stars in the age in which they live. For instance, Norman Mailer was a sensation in his day, but I don’t think anyone will be reading him for much longer, if anyone still is. Tom Wolfe will continue to be read for generations because his novels are engaging, profound, artistic, and bespeak truths about the human condition that are timeless.

Tom Wolfe’s work has received mixed critical response. Some prominent authors of the generation preceding him panned him. I don’t know what gets into critics’ heads, sometimes. You often see hubris and arrogance in them that makes them think that they have an Olympian voice about everything beneath them from their lofty height. Hemingway once said he thought he should break the jaw of one critic every year. Wolfe’s works surpass the accepted authors preceding him who panned him. Wolfe will live on while they are forgotten.

Wolfe delights, engages, paints realistic characters, realistic situations, and comments on the vital issues of human existence. I am casting this criticism out into the cyber-world as enthusiasm which must find voice, and as a recommendation to anyone who hasn’t yet been touched by this abiding artist.

I’ve just started reading the Russian classic, Fathers and Sons, by Ivan Turgenev. I didn’t know what to expect when I bought it. I was surprised with what I found in the first pages. It was spellbinding! I really enjoyed reading this classic!

I have had the idea, like a lot of people, that classics of literature are boring and dense and you have to plod through them. And that’s true of some. But not many.

Can it be that classics are classics because they are entertaining? Another way to phrase this is to say that classics are entertaining because they are written well. The artful style of telling a good tale is what makes the classic entertaining.

I first noticed this with Hemingway. I discovered Hemingway in graduate school, at the age of 27. I still remember sitting in the student lounge late at night reading, For Whom the Bell Tolls. I couldn’t put it down. At the time I was reading Hemingway, he was considered great literature. In fact, Hemingway did win the Nobel Prize for literature, and a Pulitzer Prize. Today, some scholars are debating Hemingway’s literary standing because in an age of feminism, his work is too macho. But his innovation with language, I believe, will secure his place in the literary pantheon regardless of whether he is too macho or not.

I notice an analogous entertainment value in the works of Tom Wolfe. His works are artistically plotted, and riveting to read. It’s always risky to try to discern the artistic value of contemporary writers, but I think that he may well be considered a major author of our time. He is most certainly a popular and successful writer. But I believe that his works will be considered classics after this age passes into history.

In fact, I find Shakespeare equally entertaining. If it isn’t the pace of the psychology, Shakespeare is an entertainer. A sword fight will break out after a heavy scene, or when psychology becomes too overwhelming. I don’t need to say anything about Shakespeare’s union of sense and sound. If we lived in Elizabethan England, Shakespeare’s language wouldn’t be hard to read or hear in a performance. With footnotes, contemporary readers can follow the story and discover the delights that the Bard offers.

Great literature delights. Maybe that’s why such literature is considered great. Much could be said about why literature delights–accuracy to the human situation, plot tensions that we feel . . . But that is material for another blog. This one is about the entertainment value that great literature possesses, that makes literature great.